Learning Beyond Walls: 21 Skype Resources

Written on August 22, 2010 – 5:39 pm | by Shelly Terrell

Part of the Cool Sites series

Image courtesy of @teflpet.

In the picture above you can see a great friend of mine, Emma Herrod, and her son who have video-conferenced with my classes and workshops. When the teachers in my last workshop interviewed Emma via Skype about our interaction through Skype they were excited about technology. Most of the teachers had been reluctant towards technology but Skype is one of those fantastic free tools that gets teachers new to technology motivated to try the technology. For this reason, I love to show teachers and administrators Skype. Skype is one of the top tools I introduce to teachers, administrators, and my students. This tool has tremendous learning potential, is free, easy to use, and has incredible buy-in.

I have been fortunate to have people in my Skype network who will Skype with me at the spur of the moment or make themselves available for my various classes in Germany. This year I have been fortunate to Skype in the following ways:

Emma and her son Skyped my class of 5 year-olds. Her son taught my young language learners how to make an origami box.
Emma also Skyped my adult learners to answer their questions about the UK elections and to teach them British idioms.
Steven Anderson has Skyped my administrators, teachers I’ve trained, and adult classes. Topics usually include what makes a great Skype lesson and the ideas for integrating Skype in schools.
Matthew Farber’s sixth grade class Skyped my adult class and answered questions about the differences between Germany and the US.
Candace Townsley’s sixth grade class Skyped middle school students, my director, and toddlers about the Wild West.
I have Skyped with several educators to train them online or their staff. Please feel free to ask me to Skype with your staff! I love doing this!

In the process of training teachers to integrate Skype effectively with their classes and using Skype to get my German students to interact with students worldwide, I have found several incredible resources. Feel free to share these resources with other teachers. Consider showing Skype to teachers taking the first steps with technology and who may be very reluctant to try integrating technology in their classrooms.

Langwitches Presentation: Around the World with Skype

One of the best Skype webinars I have seen! Silvia Rosenthal Tolisano’s Presentation, Around the World with Skype!

Challenge:

Try any of these resources and blog about your experience. Blogging helps you reflect and decide how you can apply this learning to improve your instructional methods.

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What are your ideas for integrating Skype into the classroom?

Tags: edtech, education technology, ESL, skype, Skype and education, Skype esl, Skype in the classroom

Posted in Cool Sites, Tech Tips, What Works for English Language Learners | 7 Comments »

Children and Cardboard Boxes

Written on August 20, 2010 – 5:02 pm | by Shelly Terrell

In addition to this blog I have been posting a few times at the Cooperative Catalyst blog, which is a fantastic forum to read various opinions on how we can transform education. The educators have vast experience and pour their hearts out in every post. This post I originally posted on the Cooperative Catalyst blog and wanted to share with you.

Give a child a cardboard box and magic happens.

The ratty, old box becomes an airplane and the child the pilot or a hospital and the child the doctor. The cardboard box takes them on adventures and helps them explore imaginary places in their minds. The cardboard box brings them joy and inspires creativity and imagination. With a few tools, they are inspired to build upon, transform, and reinvent their cardboard boxes.

Then our children are sent to schools….

which replace the former boxes. They are taught that learning happens within walls. They are taught to learn a certain way. They must sit in uncomfortable desks for long periods of time. They must remain silent and do work. They must follow the rules and stay away from the Internet. They must stop playing and daydreaming and listen to their teachers. They must sit for hours and fill out the bubbles of a test and if they don’t do it correctly then they’re forced to repeat the gruesome cycle for another year. This type of education prepares them to work in cubicles. The children who are unfortunate to be born in bad neighborhoods suffer the worst of schooling. Their schools often look like prisons. This type of education prepares them to be in prisons. In general, most of our students are learning to follow the rules, listen to authority, and forget the imagination and creativity they had as children with cardboard boxes.

Many of us have heard Sir Ken Robinson’s message, “Schools kill creativity.” This is the problem, but what is the solution?

We want our children to be creative and create. We shouldn’t want them to think outside the cardboard box; we should want them to transform and revolutionize the box just like they used to do with cardboard boxes. See, we inherently are gifted with the ability to dream. When we are children even in the worst conditions we still come out dreaming and seeing the world as it should be. Our imaginations take us to better worlds and we dream idealistically. We don’t see the barriers of reality placed by others. We don’t just see ratty, old boxes.

This is the problem, but what is the solution? So how do we as educators ensure our schools don’t kill creativity? How do we become catalysts for change?

How do we begin to reverse the damage of schooling?

We need to find ways to convince teachers not on this forum to use technology not because our students use it or will be expected to in their careers. We need to convince teachers to use technology to tear down our classroom walls. Use technology to show students that their voices can travel the world just like ours voices do when we tweet, update a status on Facebook, share a blog post, or collaborate on a ning. We need to convince teachers to use technology to motivate students to continuously research and to show them that their work transcends beyond the class bulletin board.

We need to convince teachers to develop Personal/Passionate Learning Networks (PLNs) so they hear these messages and learn to reflect and evolve their instructional practices.

These aren’t the only solutions, just the beginning.

Yet, how do we inspire teachers to react and act?

How do we go beyond spreading the word through blogs, conferences, and workshops and get teachers to act?

I believe we have educator leaders in our Personal Learning Networks (PLN) who get buy-in. Here are things I have seen them do:

They are passionate in their writing and presentations.
They show real examples of how these ideas impact students.
They commit personal time to ensuring the educators they speak to have the resources to carry out the action. Often this is in a wiki or posted on their blogs.
They record their presentations and spread them. We should never be embarrassed to be viral. I don’t see this as self-promotion. We need to be louder and not worry about offending others. In fact, we will offend others, because anyone changing a system does. We want our messages spread. Celebrities and even our youth do not find any shame in putting up their videos on Youtube, etc. That is why they go viral or become trending topics.
They research the art of giving presentations. They watch the TED Talks and read books and blogs on this subject.
They read books and blogs by revolutionary thinkers.

Does this describe you? Were you a bit embarrassed to think it did? Don’t be! We need educator leaders to be fed up, stand up, and begin spreading a message of change. We need the goal to inspire reaction and action. So now how do we as educator leaders begin to collaborate and add power to this message?

Challenge:

Let’s collaborate to find a way to change the system.

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Tags: Edreform, Education reform, standardization, students, teachers

Posted in Thought-provoking | 8 Comments »

Learning Beyond Walls- Games and Wikis!

Written on August 17, 2010 – 3:13 pm | by Shelly Terrell

Part of the Cool Sites series

Many of you have started school already and are integrating new technology in your curriculum. Wikis are one of my favorite tools for encouraging learning beyond the classroom walls. I’m sharing with you this post I originally wrote for one of my favorite blogs, ELT Digital Play, back in May. I hope you find the tips useful when creating your class wiki!

Extending Learning Beyond the Classroom Walls

Did you know that the average time spent playing video games per week is 18 hours? Imagine if your students spent 18 hours a week practicing their English or studying your subject voluntarily. Perhaps, you won’t be able to persuade your students to practice English for this amount of time, but you can get them to practice their English outside the classroom in a fun way! Many of the free games online are fantastic for language learning. My class time is highly focused on having students speak English, therefore, we rarely spend a lot of class time playing online games. Instead, the games are put on my class wiki for students and parents to enjoy at home. These games are optional, but I find that most of the children will play them at home with their parents guidance.

So what do you put in a wiki?

A wiki is like a class website, but easier to design. Wikis are free for educators and are advertisement free if you sign-up at Wikispaces for Educators or PBWorks for Educators. Both of these sites provide you with a variety of tools to embed (insert on your wiki page) to help students collaborate and build a language learning community full of resources. Below are some ideas to consider:

Have a translation button to help students and parents understand the website
Use video tutorials like the one below to help students and parents navigate the wiki

List the vocabulary and grammar the students are supposed to learn with each game
Conduct a parent workshop to teach parents how to help their children play the games and reinforce the language at home
Supplement the games with related songs, stories, finger plays, activities and/or videos
In the English Story Time wiki, I list an English story the student can read that relates to the theme in the game.
Have students use other web 2.0 tools to provide support and excitement for the game
Have students design their game characters using the Voki website or upload drawings of their characters in Blabberize
Have students write reviews of each game and how they believe the gaming experience can be improved. Encourage the students to share this with the game designer, because they will be motivated if the game designer responds.

Adding the “social” to game-based learning…

Have you watched anyone recently play a game on their Wii or PS3? You will notice that these games have virtual worlds and that players can speak through headsets to other players that are located in another part of the world. Several of our students already play these games and they enjoy them, because they get to compete with others, complete tasks with others, and interact with others. Language is learned through social interaction so it is important to add this dimension to the games we choose for our language learners to play. Wikis are great tools for adding the social networking aspect to your game-based curriculum.

Embed a Wallwisher so students can easily add in gaming tips
Embed a Google Doc where students add tips and tricks to pass certain games stages.
Embed a forum where students can discuss game strategies. Wikispaces comes with a discussion page.
Have students create graphs and charts on your computer’s software and post them on the wiki. These graphs can chart their progress on their games like how much time they took to complete a level.
- These graphs add a competitive edge as students compete to raise their rankings.

Useful links:

“If the child is not learning the way you are teaching, then you must teach in the way the child learns” - Rita Dunn

Challenge:

Try integrating wikis or games into course content to motivate students to learn beyond the school walls.

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Tags: back to school, edtech, ELT, games, gaming, wiki, wikis

Posted in Cool Sites, Tech Tips, What Works for English Language Learners | 2 Comments »

To Grade or Not to Grade? by Tom King

Written on August 11, 2010 – 2:47 pm | by Shelly Terrell

Part of the series: Global Issues in Education by Guest Author, Tom King

To grade or not to grade? That is the question, but what is the answer?

How did you feel the first time you had a grade attached to you? You know…a letter C, maybe with a + or a -. Or maybe a number, like 82 or 69?

Suppose you had a good grade way back when; did you deserve it? Or, how about a bad grade in 3rd grade? Was your performance really that bad? Well, the teacher must have thought so. How did it affect your view of yourself? Were you the better or the worse because of it?

No Child Left Behind, that wonderful mantra, is still leaving far too many behind…attaching their accumulated standardized test scores to their teachers and their schools, assigning extra homework to the errant teachers and closing those bad, bad schools. But how do these test scores help the individual student from being left behind? They advance or retreat one child at a time.

So, what’s really wrong with a grade or a standardized test score? The pundits and experts call them objective scores, as they are thought to be free from subjectivity and less prone to error. OK. So someone who really believes this, please tell me what a D- is, or what’s a 72? Is there a teacher or an objective test out there with the wisdom of Solomon who can defend the complete objectivity of the grade or the test score? Anyone? Anyone? I thought not.

So, how do we assure that students possess the needed skills and competencies to succeed? How do we know if they can do quality work? How about we look at their work? Why not put each student, with help from their teachers, parents and mentors, in charge of designing, creating and collecting their best, summative projects, papers, videos, presentations, collaborations, apprenticeships (maybe), designs, solutions, poems, pictures, dreams, improved work,….well you get it: a Personal Portfolio of the Emerging Learner. Authentic assessment, if you will.

Why, with help, most students could create an assessment rubric too, so they can learn to judge the quality of their own work. Of course, they want reviews and input and suggestions from their teachers, fellow students, parents, mentors, Skype-buddies…you name it. In time they may need less help and have far more confidence in their skills.

Wouldn’t that be far more meaningful than a number or a grade? Sure, students and teachers could keep a checklist of skills possessed, works in progress or improvements still needed. But, most of us in this profession can look at a student’s chosen, best work and immediately tell what they know and what they don’t know. Even better, with a little help, so can they.

Think of the time and energy saved from all the irrelevant, meaningless measuring we now do. And no one really, truly knows what it means for each learner. Or, finding something effective to remediate it.

It’s time to make some fundamental changes in our educational system. How about replacing grading and testing with Personal Portfolios of Excellence and Progress? When they leave their classes next spring, they can only take their fond memories of their good teachers along with them. How about giving them the gift that keeps on giving: Learning how to learn.

Take a look at the changes we tried at our Saturn School of Tomorrow some years ago. We need more ideas like this one. Real reform. Not a race to the top of something that won’t be there next year.

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Tom King is a retired math teacher, the founder of the Saturn School of Tomorrow, adjunct professor for 35 years +, husband, father, grampa, friend, tennis and golf partner, coffee buddy, reader, photographer, poet, and a marveling lifelong learner. He blogs at Tom King’s Blog of De-Fog and tweets by the handle, @profTK. Read his previous contributions to Teacher Reboot Camp.

Tags: abolish grades, Edreform, grading, race to the top, TomKing

Posted in Global Issues in Education | No Comments »

Happy Birthday #Edchat PLN!

Written on August 10, 2010 – 5:47 pm | by Shelly Terrell

Part of the Cool Sites series

#Edchat turns ONE this week!

THANK YOU!

It has been an incredible year of opening a conversation to over 2000 educators weekly! The conversation began a year ago with 3 educators (Tom Whitby (@TomWhitby), Steven Anderson (@Web20Classroom), and I (@ShellTerrell)) who desired education reform and saw the need for educational stakeholders to discuss, debate, explore, and reflect on various issues which impact education. This was how the hashtag, #Edchat, began but really it has been an amazing year because you contribute each week by:

suggesting topics on the poll
voting for topics
engaging in the discussion
transforming the conversation into action at your schools

In it’s first year, #Edchat has inspired, motivated, and transform educational stakeholders. We have a diverse group of student teachers, parents, students, administrators, and community leaders who participate weekly in order to collaborate on improving our education systems worldwide!

In the first year, Edchat has seen great moments, such as:

winning the Edublogs Award for Most Influential Tweet Discussion
involving guest speaker Alfie Kohn!
being a trending topic on Twitter!
inspiring several blog posts from educators worldwide
birthing collaborative projects, such as The Reform Symposium E-Conference

Please leave a message of how Edchat has impacted you on this Wallwisher by clicking anywhere on the wall!

Helpful Edchat Resources!

Edchat is transformational because of you! Here are helpful resources to become more involved or to help introduce educators to Edchat!

Edchat: Join the Conversation post- Read about the origins of Edchat and how to participate.
Video: Edchat: Join the Movement!

Tom Whitby explains the origins of Edchat and the motivation!
Grab your Edchat Edublog Award to embed on your blog!
Edchat Wiki with all the Archives!
Edchat Facebook page!
Edchat Group on The Educator’s PLN Ning!
Edchat Weekly Statistics and Contributors!
7pm NYC EDT: Edchat Weekly Summaries by Steven Anderson.
12pm NYC EDT: Edchat Weekly Summaries by Berni Wall.
How to Participate in Edchat Using Tweetdeck.
Several Edchat resources on @Cybraryman1’s website!
Edchat Twitter Participant List.
Easily follow Edchat participants with Blast Follow.
Edchat Poll to vote for topics.
Edchat Twitter Parade.

We’d like to thank the following for their weekly dedication to Edchat:

Regular Weekly Moderators- @rliberni (Berni Wall), @kylepace (Kyle Pace), @mbteach (Mary Beth Hertz)
Jerry Swiatek (@Jswiatek) archives all the Edchats
Steve Johnson (@EdtechSteve) maintains the Edchat wiki

Challenge:

Get another educator involved in the Edchat conversations which take place every Tuesday at 12pm NYC EDT and 7pm NYC EDT! Participate by engaging a few and adding #Edchat to the end of your tweet.